Does her Meld +Damage have some internal cooldown or something? I was playing her for the first time in a practice game last night and I came to the following conclusions:

1. +Damage doesn't seem to work if you move out of Meld then attack as opposed to just attacking out of Meld
2. Dust completely fucks her over because she has 0 escape if anyone with a stun is chasing her

Does her Meld +Damage have some internal cooldown or something? I was playing her for the first time in a practice game last night and I came to the following conclusions:

1. +Damage doesn't seem to work if you move out of Meld then attack as opposed to just attacking out of Meld
2. Dust completely fucks her over because she has 0 escape if anyone with a stun is chasing her

To make Meld work, it needs to do attack first before movement. Been stealing it with Rubick and it's more the range it get and plus the 200 extra damage. nope, no internal cooldown, just the 8 seconds of the meld Cd... i think...

I laugh at blink TAs. Much like blink SFs. Blink is used for positioning, not engaging. If you can't use blink to aim a meld that hits 4 people on their team, do not buy it. If you can't use blink to aim shadowrazes to kill 4 people, do not buy it.

You can try to reason through how the pro players build a hero and try to mimic it, but in cases like this, you really, really should not. The reason they buy blink is because they are a hell of a lot better than you. This is directed at everybody, don't get blink on TA. 2150g for zero stats for an item that won't do you much good, an early desolator would help you a lot more in most non-pro games. Or go for manta, the item that used to be core for TA in DotA1.

Or just don't pick TA at all, raging joke of a hero and massively countered by several heroes in the game, even if you don't see them much. Lucifer comes to mind, between the fast radiance he can farm and SE he can destroy a refraction stack in half a second, and if you're actually a great player he can just doom you and you're still dead, skill or not. The only reason anyone plays this garbage hero is because she's hard to beat mid, but that will change, too. One of many heroes who were not ever picked in DotA1, expect to see her disappear as the rest of the heroes are added, I think.

Don't see how any of the remaining heroes would be extremely powerful against TA mid. Except maybe BB. Or Medusa. That doesn't even make sense, but nobody fucks with Medusa and I'm going to burst if she isn't ported next week.

Isn't the reason for TA's popularity kind of that she handles a lot better in Dota 2? Like I recall Meld and Psi Blades being seriously clunky in DotA in contrast to how they work in Dota 2. In Dota 2 she's quite fun to play, but in DotA she was a tiny bit frustrating.

It's not mid that matters, it's how these heroes can open up lane and team choices in general. A good sand king player would stomp TA mid, but how often do you see someone try it? Right now people play the game to get someone fed mid, someone who can grab runes and gank. In the future we might see more DotA1 behavior, where your mid exists only to trash their mid.

TA doesn't feel any different to me, refraction is a bit faster but meld is just as abrupt as it always was.

In the future we might see more DotA1 behavior, where your mid exists only to trash their mid.

And Puppey explained why this isnt used anymore when he streamed and casted some competetive games today. What happens when you pick a hero only to trash one of the other teams heroes and that hero moves away from the lane or get replaced? What if you build your other lanes to be stronger than the other teams and then shuts down the counter pick?
There is no place to counter pick specific heroes without taking in regard the whole strategy of the team.

SK forcing TA to leave mid is already a win. She won't farm well in other lanes because people have room to pressure her. Mid heroes exist as mid heroes because it is the lane they can survive in due to extremely close tower proximity and hill advantage. She leaves mid, SK farms 8 minute blink and you're going to have even worse problems. The reason this is the way the game is now is because people can play that way and survive. Add in most of the tank initiators like BB and TC and you can easily prevent a TA from leaving mid, a hero like BB can just follow her around and kill her anywhere she goes.

We can bring back the inability for the pro scene to adapt rhetoric, you saw what tiny/wisp did when people gave that a spin. Plenty of strategies would absolutely crush the current meta, but people aren't willing to take the chance. Puppey might be a smart lad, but for the above reason alone I will have to kindly disagree. Strategy for some is still not strategy for all.

It's not mid that matters, it's how these heroes can open up lane and team choices in general. A good sand king player would stomp TA mid, but how often do you see someone try it? Right now people play the game to get someone fed mid, someone who can grab runes and gank. In the future we might see more DotA1 behavior, where your mid exists only to trash their mid.

TA doesn't feel any different to me, refraction is a bit faster but meld is just as abrupt as it always was.

Why would SK crush TA in mid? Use Sandstorm to kill Refraction and establish lane control through Caustic Finale?

I also do landscaping on weekends with some mexican kid that I "hired". He's real good because he's 100% obedient to me and does everything I say while never complaining. He knows that I am the man in the relationship and is completely submissive towards me as he should be.

A caustic SK who knows how to time creep deaths can beat almost anyone in lane. If he knows what he's doing your only choice is to back off when creeps get to half health, because once he tags them all one burrow strike and you just ate a 600 damage nuke at level 5. Sandstorm is just a bonus that makes it impossible for her to get kills on him or even abuse him with the refraction spam she usually does to people.

A caustic SK who knows how to time creep deaths can beat almost anyone in lane. If he knows what he's doing your only choice is to back off when creeps get to half health, because once he tags them all one burrow strike and you just ate a 600 damage nuke at level 5. Sandstorm is just a bonus that makes it impossible for her to get kills on him or even abuse him with the refraction spam she usually does to people.

And TA doesn't have the range to poke SK while safely out of caustic range...

What about a hero with a long range, like Drow or Sniper? Wouldn't they be able to just plink SK while he's trying to set up a chain and be able to be safely out of range before he sets it off?

I also do landscaping on weekends with some mexican kid that I "hired". He's real good because he's 100% obedient to me and does everything I say while never complaining. He knows that I am the man in the relationship and is completely submissive towards me as he should be.

Sure, he's not unbeatable mid, if that's what we're talking about. When I said "in lane" I meant more "he's strong anywhere he goes." He is aided by his innate power early game in going mid against heroes without range.

A caustic SK who knows how to time creep deaths can beat almost anyone in lane. If he knows what he's doing your only choice is to back off when creeps get to half health, because once he tags them all one burrow strike and you just ate a 600 damage nuke at level 5. Sandstorm is just a bonus that makes it impossible for her to get kills on him or even abuse him with the refraction spam she usually does to people.

Cant see this happening. storm has 40s CD at level one and pitiful aoe range. caustic is nice and all but how does he get rid of the defensive refraction charges on TA in the first place as melee? The only scenario i can see is SK getting raped big time with psi blades.

Cant see this happening. storm has 40s CD at level one and pitiful aoe range. caustic is nice and all but how does he get rid of the defensive refraction charges on TA in the first place as melee? The only scenario i can see is SK getting raped big time with psi blades.

Only scenario I see is pick Batrider. Doesn't matter where or when, just pick Batrider.

I also do landscaping on weekends with some mexican kid that I "hired". He's real good because he's 100% obedient to me and does everything I say while never complaining. He knows that I am the man in the relationship and is completely submissive towards me as he should be.

Cant see this happening. storm has 40s CD at level one and pitiful aoe range. caustic is nice and all but how does he get rid of the defensive refraction charges on TA in the first place as melee? The only scenario i can see is SK getting raped big time with psi blades.

Psi blades are easy to avoid, refraction doesn't start out with 15 charges per use. TA takes levels to be a hero just like sand king.

That's a bit of a no-brainer, even in 6.75 Bat was a top tier solo mid hero, along with Silencer and OD.

Do you mean 6.74? 6.75 was when he got buffed to hell and back, 6.76 just nerfed his crazy STR gain.

What makes you say Silencer and OD are top tier mids now? Silencer doesn't have much besides orbwalking if you do the normal glaive/stats build (and bottle counters most of the effectiveness of Curse.) OD can be a pain in the ass with imprisonment spam, but I don't think that'd be enough to win on CS with him... Invoker could just use Exort to make up for lost damage and QoP would probably win CS by pressuring OD out of attack range since his attack range sucks.

Seems like QoP would still be the best overall mid... great at ganking, blink gives her easy rune control, lane control with scream, and free harassment by flipping daggers at people.

I also do landscaping on weekends with some mexican kid that I "hired". He's real good because he's 100% obedient to me and does everything I say while never complaining. He knows that I am the man in the relationship and is completely submissive towards me as he should be.

He can prison when you go to last hit and he doesn't even have to deny to stop you from CSing. AP gives him int which gives him damage which makes him hard to stop from CSing in the meantime. OD is a "safe" choice because against nearly any hero he can at least farm some and deny some if he prisons properly. I'm not sure why he likes Silencer myself, last word + curse combo is really BS against some heroes, though.

Personally, I consider weaver a far stronger mid than QoP, I'm just waiting for people to use him again. Shukuchi + geminate proc spam can wreck squishy heroes like QoP and you just can't beat his 522 movespeed to the runes. His ganks are also a lot harder to deal with, imo. QoP's AoE can be right nasty if you don't see it coming, but if you survive her initial burst she's done if you just jump on her. She really is so easy to kill it's hilarious how much people try to run away from her.